Ken Smith, semi-retired American expat, living in Mexico for seven years after five years in France, a year in Denmark and another year bouncing around Europe — Italy, Switzerland, Germany, UK, Belgium, Netherlands, Sweden, Croatia and Romania. Here, for travelers, expats and potential expats, you will find news, experiences and advice.

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French men don’t bathe, women are immoral

Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose. The more things change, the more they stay the same. I was living in France when French-bashing by Americans increased because the French government said the stupid war in Iraq was a stupid idea. I began to receive emails from my old American friends, telling jokes and horror stories about France and the French people — cowardly, ungrateful, smelly and, worst of all, anti-war.

What I saw and heard did not match the perceptions of the American public nor the drumbeat narrative of the news media and politicians. You may have noticed that Franco-American relations warmed four or five years ago, and this was because of the election of French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who was a smaller version, in both size and character, of George W. Bush.

There was a handbook explaining the French, written 60 years ago for American GI’s. A decade ago, it was translated into French, republished, and even made the best-seller list in France.

Written by an anonymous American author in the US War Department (as the Department of Defense was more appropriately called back then), the guide was originally entitled 112 Gripes About the French, but the new translation is more politely called Nos Amis les Français (Our Friends, the French).

The book was first published in 1944 and given to American troops in France after D-Day. The purpose of the book was to explain to Americans the cultural differences between Americans and French, and to correct what the US government then considered to be mistaken beliefs about France and the French.

Presented as a list of questions and answers, the book had 112 stereotypes as to how Americans viewed the French. Many of these ideas are still held today by Americans regarding the French.

Gripe Number 6: “We spend our time getting the French out of trouble. Have they ever done anything for us?”

The answer given to the GIs was: “Of, course they have. There were 45,000 French volunteers who fought for U.S. independence. It was France that came to our aid at our darkest hour. They helped us out of an even worse scrape. During the American revolution, when nearly the whole world was against us or indifferent, France came to our aid and was our greatest benefactor.”

Balbino Katz, the editor of a French history magazine, found the old book for GIs in a stack of used books for sale. He bought it, translated excerpts and published them in his magazine. This caught the attention attention of Le Cherche Midi, an arts book publisher in Paris.

“We’re noticing today, with a bit of sadness, that Americans’ prejudices about the French are the same today as they were back in ’45,” Katz told Associated Press. He insisted he is not anti-American and said Americans are wrong to think France is ungrateful for their war sacrifices.

If the French seem don’t bathe often enough (Gripe Number 45), it is because the Germans hogged the soap, the book for GI’s said.

“The French drink too much,” according to Gripe Number 22. “That’s what they think of us,” the GIs were told. “But, you very rarely see a Frenchman drunk. They have never liked cocktails and don’t particularly like whisky. On the other hand, they drink wine, and with reason. Their vines and wines are among the best in the world.”

Gripe Number 56: “French women are immoral.” Answer: “The immoral Frenchwomen are, of course, the easiest women for us to meet. That’s why we meet so many of them.”

Gripe Number 7: “We cannot trust the French.” The handbook’s author replied that this “depends on what you mean by trust. If you expect the French to react like Americans, you will be surely disappointed. They are not Americans. They are French.”

About 15,000 copies have been sold since in France since the book was republished, according to Le Cherche Midi. It made L’Express magazine’s best-seller list for two weeks last month.

In the a press release about the book, Le Cherche Midi said: “It seemed important to us to reissue the veritable and true jewel that this practical manual is, distributed to GIs in France to answer all their questions about these strange Frenchies.”

And, in answering Gripe Number 5, the book told the GIs: “You don’t have to love the French. But you don’t have to hate them either. You might try to understand them.”

Update: Since I first learned about this book being translated and published in France, I found on the web a site with the full text of 112 Gripes. It’s well worth a click.

And, here is the foreword to 112 Gripes, as written by the original War Department authors and editors:

Foreword to 112 Gripes

AMERICANS believe in the right to criticize. We defend our right to “beef” or “gripe” or “sound off”. We insist upon the right to express our own opinions.

But we also believe in the right of others to express their opinions. For the right to speak involves the duty to listen. The right to criticize involves the responsibility of giving “the other side” a fair chance to make its point. We know that the truth can only be found through open and honest discussion, and that the common good is served through common attempts to reach common understanding. In one way, Democracy is the long and sometimes difficult effort which free men make to understand each other.

This booklet tries to help some of us understand an ally – the French. It is not meant either to “defend” the French or to chastise those Americans who do not like the French. It is intended simply to bring into reasonable focus those irritations, dissatisfactions and misunderstandings which arise because it is often hard for the people of one country to understand the people of another.

The booklet uses the Question-Answer form. It lists the criticisms, misconceptions and ordinary “gripes” which American troops in Europe express most frequently when they talk about the French. Each comment, or question, is followed by an answer — or discussion. Some of the answers are quite short, because the question is direct and simple. Some of the answers are quite long, because the “questions” are not questions at all, but indictments which contain complicated and sweeping preconceptions.

The purpose of the present publication is to present facts and judgments which even the well-intentioned may tend to overlook.

There may be those who will consider this booklet a catalogue of (( excuses )) or (( justifications )). To them it can only be said that the truth is not denied by giving it a derogatory label.

There may be others who will seize upon the questions with triumph – ignoring the discussions entirely. That kind of reader will ignore the truth anyway – in whatever form it is offered.

This booklet may not convince those who are hopelessly prejudiced, but it may help to keep others from being infected by the same lamentable virus.

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"Leaving America is like losing twenty pounds and finding a new girlfriend."
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